Fusion #19: Hexie "Flower"

I totally fell in love with the photo inspiration for the Fusion #19 challenge, where you can make a card based on the photo, the sketch, or a fusion of both.

If you're interested, here's my thought process on the design as it relates to the elements of the photo:

1) Pink presents => top two rows of hexies

2) White car => bottom two hexies

3) Person standing and talking to driver => vertical black sentiment

4) Draped canvas in background => screen mesh

While I was arranging the elements, I really liked the "flower" made by the negative triangles surrounding the middle hexagon. So I thought my story could be about a bee flying around a flower. That's where the stitched circles came from.

An actual flower is in the middle with a scrap piece of lace for the leaf. You can also see the patterned paper inside of the card.

Come by the Fusion Challenge to see what the other talented ladies have created for you:

Amy Tsuruta

Stacey Schafer

Lyndal Higgins

Lynn Mangan

Geri Freeman

Thanks for looking!
-Kelly

CFC #116: What's Up Buttercup?

We've got a challenge at CAS-ual Fridays that many of you have a lot of experience with ... sequins and chevrons! Probably not a big stretch, right? But I was surprised at how slow I was getting started. It's a very general challenge with not a lot of direction, and I typically find those the most challenging. So many possibilities of where to go.

This challenge is graciously sponsored by Ellen Hutson, and the winner will receive a $25 gift certificate to spend there! 

 

In the end I decided to go with a text-based card again. I had a blast getting out several different alpha sets (five are used here) and playing around with font choice and color. The chevrons, from CAS-ual Fridays Rad set, make up a portion of the "u" and point, well, up! The sequins are silver stars that I've had for decades, literally.

I used two layers of mat board underneath to give it dimension, so you know this one is not destined for the postal service. I've just decided that I want all my cards to have panel of patterned paper on the inside, and am really excited about that! I've got miles of paper (from buying them in packs of 25 at our local discount stores) that I seriously need to start making a dent in otherwise I think our upstairs floor may start bowing. I've also been making envelopes for each card with the patterned paper and am in love. More about that later : )

Thanks so much for looking, and hope to see you in the gallery!

-Kelly

Papertrey September Blog Hop

 

Here's a fun, rolled paper Christmas ornament to try, made out of triangles. This is for the September Papertrey Blog Hop where we are challenged to make a wreath.

 

Papertrey does have some dies for this, but you can certainly cut your own triangle banners. As long as you have a consistent height on the short, flat side you'll be fine. You'll never be able to tell if the two long sides are not at the same angle. 

At first I did some out of magazine paper, but since it was so thin, each roll was pretty skinny. And that would mean I'd have to make A LOT of them to complete the circle. So instead I used some fun card stock (Crate Paper Acorn Avenue Chestnut Boutique). Just make sure to mist the top of the triangle with water if you're working with a thick paper. Otherwise it's impossible to roll around the toothpick.

Once you've rolled the triangle, make it into a bead by putting some glue on the tip to hold it in place. Then start gluing them all together to form a wreath. I alternated long, patterned rolls with short, white rolls to give the wreath more variety.

  

 Since this is for our Christmas tree, I added our initial in the middle. It's die cut from the Papertrey Modern Alphabet Uppercase set. At first I hung it with fishing line, but it was too hard to get the letter to stay in the right place, so I ended up using a fine gauge wire instead. The hollow white paper bead worked perfectly to thread the wire through and then bend to keep it in place.

Because I wanted it to look nice on the back, I chose to spend a little more time and glued the beads together on the sides, instead of gluing them on a circular base. Just glue the beads together on the very bottom sides so they form a more natural circle. Not that I want to point out my mistakes, but you can tell on the left side where the white beads are facing a little down instead of straight out. That's because I glued them too high on the bead. Next time I'll know : )

Thanks for looking! It's been awhile since I've joined the Papertrey Hop and I've missed it!

- Kelly

A Few Randoms

Hi guys! It's my turn on CAS-ual Fridays Stamps to show a couple cards. Here they are ...

Watercolors for the flower and bottom of the zig zags. The sentiment is pieced together from three different sets. 

 Loving Thoughts, Rad, Frankly, Zigs and Zags 
   

 A layered sentiment, and an explosion of sequins! The houndstooth border is inked in the middle and then on each edge with a different color to get a gradient effect.

Frankly, Houndstooth

Thanks for looking!
-Kelly

Craft Swap - Very Dangerous!!!

We are so lucky to have a lot of crafting friends who like to get together and do card swaps, workshops, parties, demonstrations, or whatever fun thing comes up. Our friend Helen is usually the ring-leader, and recently she came up with the idea to host a craft swap. Oh my!

Being as smart as she is, she announced it 3-4 months in advance so we all had plenty of time to set things we no longer needed aside. I thought I was doing pretty good with my two boxes of stuff, but when I got there I was absolutely amazed. 

 

 She had 8-10 banquet tables that were jam packed full of crafting goodness.

The tables were all organized by type of supplies. Wood stamps, clear stamps, cutting tools, general craft supplies, fabric, paper, stickers/rub-ons, tins, etc.

 We all received numbers in the order we arrived.

 Everyone had a chance to browse through the supplies, and then according to your number, we all got to individually pick out one item.

 I picked a Creative Memories double hexie punch (above). I've seen the circle and square ones before, but had no idea they made a hexagon set!

 On the next round we got to individually go through and pick three things.

Then there were a couple rounds where you had one minute to stuff whatever you wanted in your  bag. Sounds easy, but it's definitely harder than it seems. You get a little paralyzed! 

 Finally at the end, we all went through and leisurely picked among the remaining items.

 

The dangerous element to this whole event is that you seem to come home with more than you brought. Because how can you pass on cool number stamps?! Or a binder full of Quick Cuts dies? An assortment of Prima flowers? A mini album kit? Vintage lace and ribbons? Or a set a mini pie tins from your friend's grandma?

Right?!

Your nicely purged work-space doesn't stay organized for long! 

The other surprising thing is how much you missed. People would come out of the garage with the coolest treasures that didn't even register with me when I was looking.

 

Amazingly, there was not one item that remained. We invited a lady who worked with disabled folks, and she was going to find a use for whatever was left. 

What a fun time we all had!

Thanks, Helen, for a wonderful afternoon! And Rene too, I know a LOT of the goodies came out of your craft wing : )

ETA: Here's a photo of all the goodies that came home with me ...

 
From left to right, in a kinda clockwise order:

spools of ribbon, 2 stamp sets (travel, calendar), black cat lace, Christmas beading ornament kit, large acrylic blocks, double hexagon punch, Prima flowers, album of Quick Cuts dies, yellow moire ribbon, belt buckles, red Teresa Collins mini albums, huge box of alpha stamps, bag of ribbon, make your own album kit, 7 gypsies vintage tags, several stamp sets & individual stamps, typewriter rub-ons, yellow centers for flowers, mini pinecone bunch, white daisies just waiting to be colored, vintage jello mold tins, circle punch, gold hoops, metal-rimed tags, bendable thin rubber ribbon, large bag of buttons, leather straps, cool set of large alphas on blocks, round felt/fabric pieces, several sets of clear stamps (calendar, alpha, numeric, designs, etc.) square chipboard, 4 different laces. Oh, and about 30 old Paper Crafts magazines and special issues still in my trunk.   

 Thanks for looking!
- Kelly

Fusion #18 - Hi, Chicka!

 

I have to admit, the new Fusion Challenge was a tough one for me. I wanted to use the photo, without stamping teacups. The patterns on the teacups and pots are fun, but I finally settled on the pattern that is floating around in the middle. It's the round, green, kiwi-looking design that appears twice in the photo below.

That kiwi inspired the arrows I stamped around the sentiment. Originally I stamped them all right from the ink pad, but it looked rather stark. So next time I used generational stamping to get the arrow shapes to stand out more from the dark impressions, yet still fill the circle around with the light impressions. The green was sponged on.

I was inspired to use my label maker by Aga. Her cards always look so fun with labels! Would you believe the label maker is actually my own from the early 80's? I have plenty of tape left over (that still sticks, amazingly!!) because, apparently, even as a child I hoarded craft supplies. I'm better now : )

Come by the Fusion Challenge to see what the other talented ladies created:

Amy Tsuruta

Stacey Schafer

Lyndal Higgins

Lynn Mangan

Geri Freeman

Thanks for looking!
-Kelly

PS. upon looking up the slang word "chicka," I've found that it's a misspelling for the word "chica." After some reflection, and consideration of making another label, I decided that's the beauty of making your own cards. If you and your girlfriend type "chicka" back and forth to each other, you can darn well make a card saying that, and know that it is completely custom for her!

CFC #115 - "You Are Awesome" Leaf

Jackets on the weekend, windows open at night, summer flowers fading in the garden ... it's definitely time for Fall at home! Time for Fall at CAS-ual Fridays as well, as we have a fun challenge to get you in the spirit. The winning card receives a wonderful gift from our sponsor Simon Says Stamp.

Use any combination of Fall colors, and at least one leaf, and you'll fit right in.

The "you are awesome" Dear Lizzy rotary stamp is repeated on the left side of the leaf to mimic the veins in the leaf. I cut out a leaf shape from the greige paper, as well as mat board that is underneath to give it dimension. Does anyone else hate using dimensional tape? I don't like when your panel is squished and you end up with little mountains and valleys. Using a flat, consistent piece of thick mat board seems to work better for me.

Please check out the other examples from our very talented CAS-ual Fridays Design Team, as well as consider entering a card of your own. Hope to see you there!

Thanks for looking!
-Kelly